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Tuesday, August 05, 2008

New curling championship; Korab madness

Just a few days after The Dominion golf-fest for the Sandra Schmirler Foundation (see previous posting) comes word that Canadian curling’s favourite insurance company is jumping in – again – with two more event sponsorships.

This is in addition to their partnership with Canadian Curling Association, which offers an amazing curling club insurance program, plus their work with numerous curling teams and grass roots events.

First came word of the new name of the Toronto Curling Association’s Junior Bonspiel, a legendary post-Christmas affair which has served as a kind of curling exchange program with Switzerland. Past champions – which indicate just how old this venerable event is – include Wayne Middaugh, John Kawaja, Alison Goring, Mike Harris and many more. Glenn Howard even lost the final.

Imagine winning your club championship, and then having a national championship to go to for your efforts!

With the first such championship set for November 2009 in Toronto, and with plans to take the event across the country in the years to come, this is yet another step in The Dominion’s direct outreach to the average curling club and its local community.

Great news and we look forward to further details coming in the future.

What else is happening? Tons, actually ...

• Team Brad Gushue lead man and chief funnyman Jamie Korab has been busy. His company, Bell/Aliant, is an official Canadian Olympic partner and sponsors four athletes, all of whom will be in Beijing for either the Summer Olympics (which starts Friday) or the Paralympics (which begin September 6).

Turns out Korab went around with a professional crew and filmed them in action, and conducted some interviews. He also tried their sports out... yes, we’re serious!

See Jamie try kayak! And fencing! And wheelchair basketball! And good heavens!

• Much ado about New Zealand, as their nationals are underway (here and here) and it looks like they’ll be doing more outdoor rock chucking this week, starting today, in fact ...

• Michael Little has reposted his ode to curling from two years ago. We love this, specifically:

I used to believe that the world was divided into those who loved anchovies and those who would rather starve than eat one. Now I am convinced that the world is divided into those who don’t get curling, those who love curling, and those who would love curling if they only gave it a chance.

We also love the name of Michael’s blog, but for otherworldly reasons which have nothing to do with curling ...

• And finally, we at TCN can remember the times when curling was scoffed at in the press... and even further ago, when it wasn’t even mentioned in the press. However nowadays, irregardless of sarcasm, we have stories – like this one – in which curling is actually praised while luminary summer Olympic sports, like athletics, get lampooned.

Is this really happening? Perhaps one day we’ll wake up, and it’s all been just one crazy dream ...